We can lend wings to your marketing, and spurs to your sales.

Need to reexamine your strategies?
All of them?

Business, marketing, communications, sales?
Are you sure you
still fit the market niche
you’ve chosen?

The nature of the volatile technology industry requires constant reassessment of your core value proposition to determine its ongoing validity. Maybe it’s time you weighed your business plan and marketing ambitions against Geoffrey Moore’s Chasm strategy and his Technology Adoption Life Cycle.

Our Marcom Audit
can help you do this by weighing the results against both our Marketing-focused and Communications-
focused Checklists.

There are three deliverables:
The Marcom Audit; a Market Development Strategy Checklist, based on Paul Wiefels Chasm Companion; and Keith Bates’ Communications Support Plan, which evolved from work done for IBM many years ago.

Solutions

The Marcom Audit

For CEOs and Marketing execs we offer a checklist solution to the eternal question of “Are we still headed in the right direction?”

The EXTERNAL Audit, defined:
The external Marcom Audit is a review of your marketing communi-cations, every single facet of it, from top to bottom! Not just advertising, but PR, branding, your web site, email marketing, packaging, collateral, trade show displays, products, corporate ID, direct mail, telemarketing, etc. The Audit searches for inconsistencies in message and appearance. It searches for a lack of focus and continuity between what's promised and what's delivered. Most of all, it seeks to determine if the company is speaking with one voice; and whether the perception by the market matches the perception of management. And following this analysis, it offers suggestions for repairing weak links in the total communications chain.

The INTERNAL Audit, defined:
Ultimately the goal of the internal Marcom Audit is to identify obstacles to the communications process among employees and vendors. Misunderstandings and communication breaks, which cloud the perception of a shared vision, need to be corrected. A detailed analysis of every communications device, every marketing attitude, every bit of customer related knowledge, and the relationships between all departmental entities will be documented, studied, and cross?examined for processes that should be eliminated and those which should be repaired. It’s important that a simple, focused understanding of the product's promise to its users be clearly understood by every employee, as well as a clear picture of the perception the company wants to possess in the marketplace.

The STRATEGY CHECKLIST and Value Proposition:
Developed by Paul Wiefels this section details a fundamental methodology for expressing a market development strategy using the Market Development Strategy Checklist (or MDSC).

The MDSC consists of a set of assumptions around which a strategy statement can be built: This statement can be likened to a blueprint that one would use to build a house or office building. The starting point and underpinning of the statement–the foundation–is a description of the target customer. This, like the foundation of any structure, influences significantly how the remaining elements of the structure will be built.

The strategy statement can also be seen as declaration of intent. Such a declaration should direct the development of the go-to-market programs-for example, sales strategy, marketing communications, and the like--so that strategy and execution are directly related and unified.

A key consideration in strategy development is the value triad, a concept pioneered by Geoffrey Moore which becomes the initial basis for assessing the attractiveness of any target-market opportunity. As potential characterizations are fed into the model, the goal is to tune the outer elements of the triangle—product, customer, and application—so that the inner element, the value proposition, becomes the most compelling reason to buy.

The COMMUNICATIONS SUPPORT PLAN process:
This document sets out the what, why, when and who of planning and executing a Communications program. It also offers a lot of guidance on how to approach key tasks (such as getting detailed Marketing input). Much thought and discussion has led to the structure and sequence – as well as the content itself – to ensure that the process is understandable, and that the flow of activities is logical.

Our purpose is to layout the definitive road map that will allow planners and producers to navigate from inception to completion by the best route - and most importantly, without taking a "short cut" that will, in reality, consume more time. Its use will, of course, demonstrate how well this objective has been met. To help refine the process and keep it current, we welcome suggested changes that stem from putting the process into practice.

Developing Key Strategies, the raison d’etre for the CSP!
WHY DO WE DO IT? Ted Leavitt, author of The Marketing Imagination, and Harvard Business School Professor suggests "...the management of the marketing process can itself be a powerful differentiating device".

     OBJECTIVE: To set the stage for development of a creative platform (the Marcom Engine) . from which the many tools of our marcom arsenal will evolve and be deployed.

     STRATEGY: With the Audit in hand a strategy team reviews the broad business-plan-based strategies of senior management against the weaknesses of the current sales/marcom environment. Using this audit data and the business plan ambitions of the company strategy team members develop detailed plans in the building of a comprehensive Communications Support Plan.

     METHODOLOGY:
A. Assemble audit data and recommendations.
B. Create Audience/Positioning matrices.
C. Draft Communications Support Plan.
D. Deliver strategy parameters to Creative.

     TACTICS:
1. The Audit recommendations are reviewed in detail often suggesting such major changes as redrafting vision/mission, statements, a substantially reformed organization chart, particularly if the company is moving into business process reengineering, and possible changes in creative resource personnel whether in-house or ad agency based. Some companies create a VP of Corporate Communications if none exists.

2. Communications programs must impact every audience and contact point (body language). The Audience/Ad Vehicle chart starts this process while the Product Positioning Demand/Claims matrices define market demands relative to competitive claims.

3. At this point the first draft of a Communication Support Plan (CSP) is prepared with its four major categories of Marketing Overview, Functional Planning, Support Requirements, and the Customer Development Database outlined.

4. Detailed charts, plans, and specific ambitions are turned over to the Creative Resource for assembly as the Core Intelligence element of the Marcom Engine.